Computers and electronic devices now permeate the modern world. These devices facilitate communication in all parts of the world. In fact, laptops, mobile computers, and notebook computers allow the computer to be portable and used on business trips, at airports, etc.
Mobile or cellular phone technology has also rapidly advanced in recent years. As is known in the industry, many mobile phones now include the capability of sending/receiving emails, sending/receiving text messages, sending/receiving pictures or photographs, calendaring, browsing the internet, word processing, and many other functions. Mobile telephones that include one or more of these additional functionalities (i.e., additional functionalities other than just serving as a portable telephone) are sometimes referred to as “smartphones”. Many types of smartphones are simply smaller, portable computer devices. These smaller computers will include a processor as well as software/hardware that enable the smartphone to perform its desired functionality. There are a variety of different types of smartphones available on the market.
The advantage of the smartphone is that it provides the user with a small, handheld computer so that the user can send emails, perform his or her work tasks, etc. However, the keyboard associated with a smartphone is small and difficult to work with. Similarly, the display screen on the smartphone is small with low resolution. Such features of the smartphone make it difficult for a user to perform significant word processing or other significant computing tasks. Accordingly, many people do not use their smartphones for serious computing tasks, even though the device processor is technically capable of performing such functions.
Accordingly, it would be advantageous to provide a mechanism that would improve the ability of a user to perform computing functions on his/her smartphone. One form of enhancement which is known to exist provides a more functional keyboard as an externally connected device. Such devices are useful improvements for entering textual data, but do not address the other limitations of the mobile device's user interface such as small screen size, lack of pointing mechanism, etc. Other existing mechanisms for enhancing the display properties of mobile devices are described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/042,942 filed Mar. 5, 2008 entitled “Method and Apparatus for Providing Enhanced Resolution Display for Display Telephones and PDAs” and is incorporated herein by this reference. Display screen enhancements may improve in varying degrees the user's visual experience, but do not address the other limitations of the mobile device such as small keyboard, etc.
What is needed is a complete system in a single embodiment which addresses all the user interface limitations of mobile devices. Such a device and system is disclosed herein.